SeaWorld Orlando Lightning Incident

In July 2012, a guest received a shock as a result of an indirect lightning strike while visiting the SeaWorld theme park. She was inside the Shark Encounter exhibit when the building was struck by lightning during a thunderstorm. Since the Shark Encounter exhibit is located well within the claimed protection zone of an ESE lightning rod, the Prevectron 2 Millenium S6.60, this incident provides direct evidence that ESE lightning rods are unsuitable for the protection of theme parks and other recreational grounds.

Earlier this year, two young persons were reportedly killed when they were struck by lightning. One of the victims was a student who was struck by lightning while playing football at an outdoor stadium in Malaysia (reported in our newsletter of May 23, 2012) while the other was a young lifeguard supervisor who was also struck by lightning at a water theme park in Tampa, Florida (reported in our newsletter of November 12, 2012) In both these cases, the victims were located well within the claimed protection zones of the (ESE) lightning rods when they were struck by lightning. Both these lightning rods were manufactured in France and they fully complied with the French ESE standard, NF C 17-102.

Click here to read the complete report on the SeaWorld Lightning Incident written by Z.A. Hartono & I. Robia. (10 pages, 1,210KB)